After three shootings killed eight people near Atlanta, celebrities are calling for a stop to violence against Asians. Police arrested 21-year-old suspect Robert Aaron Long, who authorities believe targeted people of Asian descent in the shootings at massage parlors.
The killings come amid a wave of violence against Asian Americans. Lulu Wang, Daniel Dae Kim, Mindy Kaling and Olivia Munn were among those who responded.
Actor Kim said: “The race of the person committing the crime matters less than the simple fact that if you act with hate in your heart, you are part of the problem. And to those with the power to help and yet sit idly by, your silence is complicity. #StopAsianHate.”
The Farewell director Wang responded to a tweet by former NPR reporter Kat Chow that read “I want to know their names, who and what they loved, the people they had waiting for them at home, everything they hoped for. I want to know the fabric of their days and the contexts of their lives.” Wang quote tweeted, saying “I know these women. The ones working themselves to the bone to send their kids to school, to send money back home. In too much pain to know what else to say so I’ll just leave this here.”
“The violent attacks and murders against Asians are still happening. Please help us. We need help to be safe in our country. #StopAsianHate. Please,” Munn tweeted. The actress has been vocal about rising attacks against the Asian American community, including a recent attack against her friend's mother outside a New York City bakery.
Kaling also took to Twitter to say that “enough is enough.” “The targeting of our Asian brothers and sisters is sickening, but not surprising given the normalizing of anti-Asian hate speech in the past year.”